"Zachary M Hodson is a multi-genre artist based out of Kansas City, MO. Holding a B.S of Psychology with a minor in Creative Writing from the University of Central Missouri, he has spent the last decade focused equally on poetry, music and music/sports journalism. His writing has been featured in many print and online outlets, including but not limited to Euphony Journal, Leveler Poetry, The Literary Nest, Future’s Trading, Skidrow Penthouse, Royals Blue and The Deli Magazine. He can most often be found with a cold craft beer in hand and under (at least) one very fat snoring cat."

the orange frogs

she said people under forty only take one set of picturesto reduce excessive exposure to radiation she saidthe same reason old people are not full body scanned at the airport

​& why she wore a dosimeter

​she joked my future children [that i will never have] would thank me

thenthey took three sets of me

she smiled considerably less than when i was drinking tracer

the words you have a mass in your right kidney ring first like an anvilclean and sharpat once more important than deadlines or dvr schedules or the sunsetor other people

eventuallythe dancing word bubbles are poached by zealous toddlers razing about your head

​the ones not yet euthanized by ritalin

​& you are left with the single word carcinomasuspended on the lip of every proceeding thought

its the friend of the friend of nobody that invited itself to your partydropping two bags of funyuns and a half case of natty through your glass coffee tablebefore drinking up your expensive craft beer& vomiting hummus all over the ping pong table in your basement

& sure i had sometimes mused about a malady like thisnever a super deadly one mind youbut something grand enough to hit the back splash

i used to drape my hair over my face and faux cry on the trampolineat other people’s birthday partiesi once shot turtles off a cliff with a water balloon launcheri tore up my mother’s pta awards when i got caught out past curfewi stole my father’s last pair of clean work socks

i am as unstable as any otherhuman beastbut this is a weird way to get what was coming to me

​even now as i typehands elongated and pulsingi have never been so clueless as to what to feel

am i the forgotten child left alone all night after a game of freeze tagfollowing instructions till the bitter end

​someone should have done a head count before letting the bus leave

​so when presented with waitor learnor killnonchalantly explained by the doctor i would later stalk onlineall choices withholding shades of grey& results strewn about both sides of the bell curve

what do you do& how do you feel about it

these are things no one taught us in health class

i know i will eventually thaw probablyeven soon enough to realizethere are times one has to shed a failing shell& sometimes it takes a bit of the good skin as wellwhich is okay

scars are what keep us from eating the orange frogs

again

​ worm food

you are the devil the gluttonous slothyou wail at the bedroom wallcalling for your dead mother the fourteen thousandth timeas if she will suddenly appear and take you back at the teat

you are a monsteryou eat macaroni and cheese with a fork you eat everythingyou sulk in the back nook like an obese white line on a blueprintthe kind for which i don’t need a legendplain as the low creaks of dead winter

you are a hagwith nappy locks pickled by perspiration& flat arches that plead for your immediate deathan unfortunate man child making snowmen in your front yard with mashed potato flakeshaving never tasted real snow let alone seen ityou know santa claus is bullshityet still write a letter each year for your mother’s sake

you are a weathered face on the mountainthe pilgrimage for a new generation of bloodletterswide eyed fledglings ripped on the fermented spittle with which you rape them

those poor unfortunate soulsvaping like high school science projectsthe least noble of gases compounding the most volatile of heavy metalsquite convinced they are previously undiscovered elements

they fiercely greet each other side to side in publicseesawing compliments off each other like hand jobsmoderately offended to not receive blow jobs in return

they bellow your tenets with muddled gusto& this year’s boots firmly thrust up the ass of social responsibilityas we good souls of the city dodge the white-out piles of shit they leave behind in your name

you watch as they drink each other’s company until swollen and drunkbeached upon the overflowing splendor they create in your namesoon they will outgrow their motley shells and move into PBR tallboys

i scowl from the backchilled shaken stirred pendulous in the november airi was invited to the party but given a different color wristband

in my head i play out your wretched evening ritualthat scorecard you keep of likes and follows and friends and connectionsi almost have my thousand can i have a cookie nowas if you would ever give up a cookie to someone else

i would plead for a chance one single legitimate chance you pig headed mother fuckerremove the discriminating shade from my particular cellbut your formula is unforgiving and absoluteto you i have been made fictional i am a thigh gapa nah, i’m cool, but thanks anyway when offered another plate to the buffet

i’m old enough to not give a shit about your opinion i’m young enough to almost believe thatsomeday we will both be deadothers will appoint themselves to our roles of self-entitlementbut i guarantee the worms will say i taste better

lost shade, volume v: malletbreath

there was the kettle drumwho in another life would have been my fulminant loverconsummating the timbre of a single soundwave to the big crunch

i regret not her not her even in the slightest mind youtruth isshe is quite a landmine

but what we could have doneour serpentine trip to the middle would have been marvelousa triumphant parade to the tip top of the bell curve and holdingdecibels above the ho hum of my spying computer’s cooling fanof which to this day no one knows about but you

so be cool yo

i watched in pain as she finally gave up her lifeyears of wasted breathingscratched very much within the lines on imported paperacrid twirls of colored pencil lead left to die in the creases of a merlot stained sofathe creamy under fluff of her militant feminist cat owned the various air currentsoccasionally allowing me an attempt to inhale the weight of the room

also a callow bearded dreamer in the corner spokethick flattery that felt just like all the four by six fuck you for submitting rejection cardsi have stuffed into my favorite childhood lunchboxyou see childrenbefore submittablewe actually mailed stuff

i have already mostly forgotten he was a thingafter hours of scrubbing my name and image online